


grace is just weakness

by fav_littleleaf



Category: The Penumbra Podcast
Genre: Character Study, Cuddling & Snuggling, Depression, Early S.03, Fluff, Hurt/Comfort, Other, Pillow Talk, Post-Apology, Pre-Relationship, Touch-Starved
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-27
Updated: 2020-08-27
Packaged: 2021-03-06 22:40:17
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,458
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26146534
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/fav_littleleaf/pseuds/fav_littleleaf
Summary: Juno is getting better, but he has off days sometimes. Luckily Peter is there to help.
Relationships: Peter Nureyev/Juno Steel
Comments: 8
Kudos: 144





	grace is just weakness

**Author's Note:**

> Helloo, don’t mind me, just channeling my intense loneliness through these goobers. Set vaguely in Season 3, after Juno apologizes but not much after. They're not 100% comfortable with each other yet.
> 
> Title from I'll Be Good- Jaymes Young. Big Juno vibes.

Juno has been considering the merits of weakness. Just when he decides his therapist has been playing him for a fool, someone has the audacity to knock on the door. Sure, so what if he never finds happiness again.

He doesn’t answer at first (let him be weak in peace, goddamnit), but then it’s Peter Nureyev’s voice ( _Juno? Juno, are you alright?_ ), and he feels a whole other weakness rise up in him.

It’s the same kind that made him leave the door unlocked the last time he got out of bed. His therapist didn't even come up with that one — that was all Juno.

There’s relief in Peter’s voice when he palms open the door. "Are you alright? We haven't seen you in two days, and I thought — well, Rita thought —"

"Yeah," he mutters, muffled by the pillow.

Peter enters the room properly then, and he must see what a state Juno Steel is in: clothes littered across the floor, limbs tangled under a heap of blankets. The only light peeks in from one of Jupiter's moons, or something. He doesn’t know where they are.

"Oh, Juno," he says, like he had never uttered something so precious, and never would again.

Juno chokes out something nonsensical and curls away from him. In an instant Peter is kneeling at his side. He says his name again, soft and pleading, asks how he can help.

Juno squeezes his eye shut and says it, spurred by that _goddamn_ weakness. "I want you to hold me."

He braces for a _no_.

Instead he hears a soft exhale and the rustle of blankets. Arms come around him, and warmth, and relief. He means to let out a breath but a sob comes out instead. Peter breathes a gentle _shhh_ and it breaks him.

"I-I’m sorry for disappearing. I know I should get up and… eat, do _something_ when I feel like this, but... I don't know. Sometimes it's too hard." Juno sighs. Even talking is too hard sometimes.

"I know, love," he murmurs.

Juno leans back into his body, burrowing closer until there's no space between them anymore. Peter's breath is warm on his skin near the soft line of his throat, and his fingers twine through Juno's across his stomach. Juno shivers, like being warm reminded him how cold he was.

"Do you need me to bring anything? Food? More blankets?"

"No. I just want you."

"Okay," Peter says. He kisses Juno's neck where it meets his shoulder. "I love you."

Juno digs his face further into the pillow, and he stifles a groan. The thumb that had been stroking his own stills in its path.

"Forgive me, I've spoken out of turn —"

"No, don't." Juno turns onto his back, gazes up at Peter. His face is worried, creased, half-hidden in the darkness where the blue planets' glow doesn't reach. 

Juno touches his cheek. The skin is soft there, and free from makeup that hides his true self. Juno sucks in a breath, in awe of this privilege that Peter has given him. "You're really beautiful, you know that?" 

Peter laughs. His expression softens. "Not compared to you, darling."

Juno resists the urge to argue, and thaws instead under the unrepentant affection in his gaze. He trails his fingers down to fiddle with a button on Peter's shirt. Silence lapses over them. 

"Do you want to talk?" Peter says gently.

Juno knows that _no_ won’t do as an answer, so he shoves it down. He turns on his side to face Peter, finds his hand again and clutches it for strength. In answer, Peter leans forward and tips his forehead against Juno’s.

“I used to be engaged,” Juno says, his voice raspy. “Back when I was in the HCPD. Had a wedding gown rotting in my closet for years. I got rid of it when Rita and I left Mars, but it still… it feels like a part of me is missing.”

Peter squeezes his hand tightly. He doesn’t speak.

“We fought all the time, he yelled at me for the smallest things. All the time. I took it, and I — _I_ _loved him_. I kept coming back like a goddamn dog.” Juno’s voice seizes on a sob. “God, I sound like an idiot, Nureyev. Why would I miss that?”

“Juno, you’re not —”

Juno barrels ahead, deaf to his protest. “You know what happened in the end? I screwed it all up. Just like I did with you.” 

“You didn’t deserve that, love,” Peter whispers. “You deserve the world.” He pulls Juno closer to him, tucks his head under his chin. It’s a relief to not have to look at him. Peter’s arms are like a vice, and they say a lot of things his words don’t say. 

“I know. _I know._ I just need the rest of me to catch up.”

Before he can say _I’m sorry, I’m so sorry,_ Peter dips his head to graze his lips against Juno’s hair. He pitches his voice even lower. “And you know already that you weren’t the only one who messed up that night. It’s okay to forgive yourself, Juno. It’s okay to leave the past where it belongs.”

Juno swallows his apology in his throat. He leans heavily against Peter, feeling adrift with the knowledge that his burden is no longer his. To give it to Peter is to give it the power to come spinning back at him, like a boomerang but made of knives.

But the only thing that happens is Peter stroking up and down his arm, tender and reverent.

Juno allows himself to take a deep breath. “You’re right.”

The light from the porthole is fading. He isn’t sure what time it is, but it seems like the sort of time he should either be dismissing Peter or asking him to stay. He isn’t ready to do either.

"Nureyev?"

"Yes, Juno?" 

"Have you..." he swallows. "Have you ever loved anyone?"

Peter hesitates. His hand strokes over Juno's waist now, slowly, absently.

"It's okay, you don't have to tell me —"

“No one quite like you,” he says.

He gazes at Peter. He has a faraway look in his eyes as he looks over Juno’s head. Juno wishes they could lay all their secrets between them, let them be safe in the cradle of darkness. Maybe that’s a lot to ask.

"It's in the past, Juno. You're my home now."

Despite the distance between them, warmth blooms in his chest. "Say that again."

Peter's smile answers Juno's. He shifts and presses a leg between Juno’s so he’s half on top of him.

"My darling Juno," he whispers. His eyes are unbearably bright. “I am in awe of your strength every day. You are my hero and my home.”

"Come here," Juno whispers, pulling him down. He presses his nose against Peter's neck, inhaling the scent of his cologne until he's dizzy from it. “I love you, too,” he says, as if it could match what Peter just told him.

Peter’s breath hitches against Juno’s skin. Juno tightens his arms around him. It’s a few seconds before he realizes Peter is crying. 

“Nureyev. I didn't mean to upset you," he says, barely holding it together himself. “God, of course my love would make someone cry —”

Peter lets out a watery laugh. “It’s not that, Juno.”

“What is it?”

He shakes his head against the curve of Juno’s shoulder. A tear drips onto his skin. Juno lifts a hand from Peter’s back to tangle through his hair, thumb brushing the shell of his ear. Juno feels him sigh.

“Is it enough?” Peter whispers. “That I love you?”

Juno blinks. “Yeah… yeah, of course it is, Nureyev. You don’t have to… prove yourself to me.” He pointedly _doesn’t_ think about the Martian tomb, or about grasping Peter’s hand in the darkness as he opened the door to his memories. 

Peter lifts his head again and smiles at Juno, like telling him that isn’t the most natural thing in the world. His voice is already steady, as if he’d never hurt at all. “Thank you.” 

Juno traces along Peter's cheek and jawbone, memorizing the shape of his face in the dark. Peter's eyes flutter closed and his soft exhale draws Juno back into himself again.

"I'll always cherish whatever you share with me," Juno says. "Whether that's a little or a lot."

"As I will for you."

"Good." Juno grins, and kisses the corner of Peter's mouth. "Now are you going to sleep with me, or not?"

Peter says _yes_ in the way he captures his mouth and bites his lip and steals his breath, in a way that only Peter Nureyev can. Juno thinks maybe being weak isn't so bad after all.

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you for stopping by!!
> 
> chapter 2 could exist (who does/did Peter Nureyev love?!) if the peeps be interested
> 
> This is my first fic after lurking here for a couple months. Please love meee <3


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